


Would Not Believe the Light Could Ever Go

by engagemythrusters



Series: Did You Ever Dream [1]
Category: Torchwood
Genre: COE Fix-it, Domestic, F/M, Found Family, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:01:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28457970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/engagemythrusters/pseuds/engagemythrusters
Summary: How to cope when nobody knew what coping meant.
Relationships: Gwen Cooper/Rhys Williams, Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones
Series: Did You Ever Dream [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2116941
Comments: 14
Kudos: 82
Collections: Torchwood Fan Fests: 2020 Holiday Exchange





	Would Not Believe the Light Could Ever Go

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Beleriandings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beleriandings/gifts).



> Daniela!  
> I was soooooo happy to get you! You have _no idea_. First... literally all of your prompts _instantly_ clicked with me. I had to debate SO HARD with myself before I landed on the prompt I chose. In fact, I started drafts of other prompts before I settled on this. And, second, you don't hate my writing! Thank god, this fic won't be an absolute burden to you. But, most of all, you're an amazing person and I'm so happy to try to give you something that would make you (very hopefully!) happy.  
> -  
> Prompt: "Gwen and Ianto friendship fic - fix-it where Ianto survives Children of Earth and they talk about stuff after that"

Despite it being only six-thirty in the morning, Gwen woke to an empty bed. Her hand sought out the slowly fading depression in the pillow beside her, fingers still half-expecting to find themselves tangling into Rhys’s hair. She sighed when her hand rested on the pillow.

She laid like that for a while longer, slowly adjusting to being awake. Muzzy feelings crossed over her, acutely becoming sharper and shaper as her stomach began to churn. After about two months of experiencing that churning every morning, Gwen had learnt precisely how long she had before everything tried to force itself up. Five minutes.

With another sigh, she sat up, looking down at her abdomen. What a pesky little thing she had inside her. Exciting, blissful little thing, but no doubt pesky when it caused this rubbish morning sickness. She shook her head, then stood and made her way to the loo. Plonking down on the rim of the tub, she stared at the toilet and fought down the urge to vomit.

Ten minutes passed before she decided she’d won this morning. She’d managed to surpass the worst of the nausea, and she could begin her day without too much worry. So, she grabbed her toothbrush and started working on her teeth.

She grimaced at her reflection in the mirror as she brushed, noting the tangles in her hair and the circles under her eyes. Everyone looked a little worse for wear nowadays, but she definitely didn’t like the look of both wariness and weariness on her face. She hadn’t looked like that since Tosh and Owen…

Sighing for the billionth time that morning, she spat out the toothpaste into the sink, rinsing out the biting tang of mint from her mouth. Pill bottles lining the rim of the sink caught her eye. Four prescriptions for “Ifan Davies,” all emptied. She studied them for some time, then pushed them from the sink, watching them plunk into the loo’s wastebin one by one.

They mocked her as they stared up at her from the bin.

Turning on a heel, she left before the usual sinking feeling in her chest could consume her.

Gwen had no real reason to get dressed anymore. She never went out. Yet three men would tease her incessantly if she lived solely in pyjamas, so she changed. Somewhat. Track bottoms and one of Rhys’s t-shirts—not much different from her pyjamas, but enough that she could defend herself with a rude gesture and a glare if anybody dared say anything.

She glanced in the room’s mirror, running her hands over her abdomen. Not much to show yet, but soon, she’d look like she swallowed a watermelon whole. Again. The last time that had happened, she’d needed a new wedding dress. Now, she could keep stealing Rhys’s shirts, oversized on her normally smaller body.

Nodding to herself in resigned satisfaction, she made her way out of the room and toward the kitchen.

The living room, sitting at the end of the hall, was emptier than she expected. Only one head popped up from the other side of the sofa. The other two, usually accompanying the first, weren’t in sight, not even in the kitchen in the distance. Strange, considering there wasn’t anywhere else in the house to go.

She walked up behind the sofa and placed a hand on the head of soft brown hair. Ianto Jones glanced up at her.

“Morning,” she said. Oh, she sounded tired.

“Morning.” And as much as she sounded tired, Ianto sounded drained. And raspy. Gwen wondered how much coughing he’d done last night.

“How long have you been up?” she asked, rounding the sofa and sitting down beside him.

Ianto closed the book he was reading in his lap and shifted slightly, turning to face her. “A bit. Jack had to get up early.”

“Ah.” That made sense. Ianto would’ve had to have waited until Gwen or Rhys helped him up, otherwise. “Where is he, anyway?”

“Out. He and Rhys left a bit ago.”

“At this hour?” she asked, glancing at the clock. Only seven.

“They said they wanted to beat the crowds. Less people to see them.”

“Well, if they’re really worried about people spotting them, what about the CCTV? That doesn’t shut down just because it’s bloody early in the morning.”

“They’re ‘wearing disguises.’”

She groaned. “Not the—”

“—the fake moustaches, yes,” he said.

Gwen put a hand to her face. “Christ.”

“Yep.”

“Did you try telling them how ridiculous those are?”

“Went the same as always,” he said. “They thought they looked—”

He cut off, suddenly wracked by a fit of coughs. Gwen’s hand instantly went to his back, rubbing it soothingly.

“Relax,” she urged, trying to sound calm even though her heartrate had jumped by a good few dozen.

She watched as he tried to control his breathing. Her eyes shifted to the oxygen tank, checking to make sure it was working properly. She knew it would be, logically, but sometimes… Well, sometimes she just remembered those first few days in the intensive care unit, and she got scared. But it wasn’t like that, anymore. He was better now. Mostly. Well, not really, but better _enough_. And slowly (agonisingly slowly, it felt like at times), working his way to being okay. Not that “okay” was something one would normally strive to reach, but… baseline okay was an achievement at this point.

“They said they looked ‘smashing,’” Ianto managed to finish, once he could breathe properly again.

“That was Rhys, wasn’t it?”

He nodded, looking peeved. “Jack’s words were ‘it’s perfect!’”

She rolled her eyes.

While the very notion (and appearance) of those bloody moustaches were ridiculous beyond belief, Gwen did admit the need for them outweighed the absurdity of them. They were in danger of being spotted any time they went out, and it wasn’t as if they could just stop going out. They needed supplies: food, toiletries, clothes… the works. Some things could come to them (like Martha, one of the few people allowed to know Jack, Ianto, Rhys, and Gwen still existed, due to the need of a doctor for Ianto), but most things were unattainable unless someone braved the outside world. Jack was never one to be cooped up, and Rhys had a logical head for the mundane shopping trip, so they were the ones to go. Not to mention, Ianto couldn’t do much on his own at the moment, and Gwen was told to stay absolutely put until the baby was out, just in case.

Which was why she was here, on this sofa, instead of in some cottage by the sea. The choice, back when UNIT had agreed to squirrel them away from the rest of the world, had been either to split up, or to band together. And if they weren’t allowed out much, if they couldn’t be seen by anybody, then Gwen would never see Jack or Ianto again. That was absolutely out of the question when Ianto had been in such ill-health. Jack couldn’t care for Ianto on his own, not while Gwen could do anything about it. Of course, she wouldn’t be much help in a few months’ time, anyway, but for now… well, it was better to have three adults looking after a slowly recovering man than one, wasn’t it? Not to mention, four adults to look after one baby…

Thus, Ken and Ifan Davies and Genevieve and Dafydd Pallister lived together in a tiny house in the middle of nowhere in North Wales. Perfectly hidden, mostly safe, and sometimes rather lonely. Lonely when everyone was quiet, anyway. Sometimes Jack and Rhys got a bit… carried away with their antics.

“Well. I hope someone tells them to shave.” Gwen stood, then glanced down at Ianto. “Did you eat?”

He shook his head.

“I’ll get some breakfast, then.”

Ianto stared up at her.

“What’s that face for?” she demanded, folding her arms.

“Gwen, you _burn toast.”_

“Pot and kettle,” she retorted. “Besides, I’m not making toast. I’m going to—” she looked behind her at the kitchen, trying to quickly think of things that did not involve cooking “—cut… an orange.”

Ianto scoffed, sounding halfway scandalised, and she glowered at him before whirling around and making off towards the kitchen.

Rhys usually did the cooking, as he was considered the “least worst cook” of the four of them. He could do pasta quite well, and he stumbled his way decently through other dishes. That was good enough for the other three. And if Rhys wanted a night off of cooking, then Jack held the reigns. He only knew a few dishes, but he could do those dishes amazingly. However, eaten too many times in a row, salmon could become exceedingly bland. And Gwen couldn’t eat fish much anymore, according to Martha. But if Jack and Rhys both decided to fuck off for the night, Gwen was left over to cook, because Ianto couldn’t stand long enough to do so, and his oxygen concentrator wasn’t allowed near stoves. Though, even without those restrictions, he would still be the last in line to cook. He was just as horrid at it as Gwen, other than his soups. And he was the only soul on the face of the Earth to like his soups.

Slicing up some oranges, she began running through the lists of foods she couldn’t eat anymore. Last time Martha came, she’d restricted a bunch of things. Coffee, for one, but nobody had been drinking much of it while Ianto couldn’t make it.

Christ, Gwen wanted a coffee… and wine. She really wanted a glass of wine.

Sometimes, when the nightmares became just too real and too disturbing, Gwen would get out of bed and slip into the kitchen. And sometimes, Jack would already be sitting out there, kept awake by the sound of Ianto’s oxygen concentrator, or perhaps just nightly terrors of his own. In any case, he would pour himself a glass of Scotch and she would substitute a glass of wine for a glass of juice, and then they would silently toast each other’s living fears. Then Jack would down his glass in one go before kissing her head and leaving for his and Ianto’s bedroom, no doubt to make sure Ianto didn’t stop breathing on him ever again. She would stay, steadily sipping at her juice until she grew tired enough to slink back to her own room and fold herself into Rhys’s arms. Neither Jack nor Gwen ever spoke of this arrangement, but it was their _thing_. It was what they did.

A plate of oranges in her hands, she returned to the living room, where Ianto had returned to his book while he waited.

“See,” she said, holding the plate out.

Ianto glanced up from his book, eyebrows high on his head.

“Not burnt toast,” she said.

“Well,” he said, snapping the book closed. “Considering that those are oranges, I would be heavily impressed if you’d turned them into burnt toast.”

She rolled her eyes and pointedly did not retort back. She sat down beside him, careful to keep the oranges on the plate, and then handed it to him. He took a slice, and she grabbed another, and they ate in silence as he returned to his book.

Peeking discreetly, she tried to figure out what book he held. _Dracula_ , it seemed. Bram Stoker. How very Ianto.

Reading seemed to be the thing around the house. Ianto often had his nose in a book, which didn’t surprise Gwen all too much. He didn’t seem to be the sort to read back during their Torchwood days (which she sometimes still refused to believe was behind them), but now that he had nothing but time on his hands… he could be quite bookish. Jack’s reading habits shocked her, but only slightly. She’d seen him occupying himself with the occasional novel or two during breaks back then. But, most of all, she was surprised to find that Rhys had decided to join in, too. Rhys didn’t like reading, by his own admission. Though life turned monotonous some days here, and she figured when pushed, Rhys would be the sort to turn to books. Perhaps the three of them should start a “forced into reading” book club.

(The book club would go horribly, mind. None of them read anything remotely similar. Ianto was fond of his action or history or classics, while Jack stuck mainly to his cheesy, antiquated sci-fi novels. And Rhys… well, the last thing Rhys read seemed to be something like a manual for some sort of lorry. So, said book club would fail instantly, should the three of them even catch onto the fact the others were reading, too.)

Gwen vaguely wondered if she should start reading as Ianto flipped a page. Then she decided against it. Nothing they had lying around interested her.

The pair of them polished off the orange slices quickly. She set the plate on the coffee table, then leaned back into the sofa, studying Ianto. The man looked so drained. She supposed that was what came with being ill, but it still irked her sometimes. She remembered how healthy he’d looked just months before. He had finally filled out his suits and looked _happy_. Now, he looked thin and wan and exhausted.

Cycles, she figured. Natural parts of life. He’d eventually bounce back to the way he was before. The key word seeming to be "eventually," there.

Ianto caught her gaze after a few minutes.

“What?” he asked.

“Nothing,” she said quickly. “Just… thinking.”

“About?”

“I dunno…” she sighed. “How different everything is, I suppose.”

“‘Everything changes,’” Ianto quoted, his eyes drifting back down to his book.

“Yeah…” she murmured.

Her fingers fiddled away at the blanket Ianto had draped over the sofa while she dwelt on that for some time.

“Do you think he meant now?” she asked.

Ianto looked up from his book again, his eyes considering her. Then the book snapped closed and laid gently on his lap as he gave her his full attention.

“I mean, there’s a whole hundred years to the twenty-first century,” she said. “But it’s only been nine years and it’s already gone to shit.”

“I’m not sure,” Ianto said after some thought.

“Do you even think he knows?” she asked. “Because what if this _was_ it? But Jack didn’t know it was going to happen, did he?”

“No,” he said softly.

“So, if this was it, what were all those speeches for, then?”

Ianto’s lips pressed firmly together into a line as he pondered her words. She watched him, waiting.

“I don’t know if we’re meant to know,” he said eventually. “Sometimes, there’s a reason he doesn’t tell us things. We’re not meant to know our own future.”

“So, you don’t think that was it,” she prompted.

He merely shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“I hope that was it,” she said, finishing the beat of heavy silence between them. She looked up at him. “Christ, Ianto, I can’t do that again…”

And neither could he, but she didn’t say as much. She also didn’t mention that, if that wasn’t the change of the century, then Torchwood had failed. Jack had failed. Nobody was ready anymore.

She didn’t need to say it out loud for him to understand, though. 

“It’s like you said,” he said. “It’s only been nine years. Ninety-one more ‘til the end of the century.”

“Yeah.”

Silence descended upon them again. Gwen watched Ianto’s fingers absentmindedly track the edges of his book, whereas his eyes had zoned out as he thought through whatever musings he had.

“I thought I’d died,” he said after a long time.

Her heart did a strange flip in her chest, just like it did any time anyone brought _that_ up.

“You did,” she said.

“Thirty-two seconds doesn’t count.”

“It does to me,” she said.

And it counted to Jack, who had looked ready to throw himself off a cliff, and it counted to Rhys, who had grabbed Gwen’s hand so hard she still felt the crushing grip to this day. It counted to Ianto’s body, begrudgingly recovering from it. It counted to the government, who only let the four of them go because of it. It counted to Martha, returning weekly with a medical kit and hope, and leaving with the same apologies every single time. It counted to this house, it counted to Wales, it counted to the world.

It counted so much.

“I mean,” Ianto said, very softly, “for good. I thought I’d…”

Gwen wanted to beg him to move on, to make her stop _thinking_ about it, but it was clearly written in the lines of his face: he needed to talk about this.

“Was it scary?” she asked. She couldn’t help the childish question; she needed to know.

“I don’t know.” His eyes found hers, blue and wide and unguarded. “I… don’t know.”

She nodded, feeling the motion rather than acting it consciously.

“I think I’m glad I don’t,” he said then. His gaze returned to his lap. “I don’t think I want to know.”

She reached over and fixed his oxygen tube around his ear, mostly just because she felt she had to _do_ something. Gwen Cooper needed to fix things. This was something she couldn’t fix. None of this was fixable. And that frustrated and frightened her.

“Just wished it _did_ something,” Ianto said.

“What do you mean?” Gwen asked, drawing her hand back and frowning.

He gestured to his face, to his chest. “This. Was all for nothing. Went in with no plan, no way to save anyone or anything, and all we got in return—”

“You got Jack to stand up to them,” she cut him off, not much liking the direction this was taking.

“And to what end?” he demanded. “I can’t breathe, Gwen. That’s it.”

“No,” she said. Her voice trembled a little. “No, that isn’t it. You can’t know that’s it. There’s things bigger than us, Ianto—you don’t know what causes what. Maybe without that, the world would’ve—”

“You can’t seriously think that,” he scoffed.

“I can,” she said. “I can, because if I don’t, then what good is the world, anyway? What use is this planet, with all its people, ready to sacrifice children to save themselves? I can’t live in that world, Ianto. I have to believe there’s some good.”

He glanced back over to her, staring at her for quite some time.

“You did something,” she promised. “Maybe we don’t know what that was. Maybe we’ll never know. But it put us on the right path. I have to believe that.”

Silently, he reached out to her, taking her hand in his. He squeezed it lightly and reassuringly, and that was all she needed. She breathed out a shaky exhale, then sniffed.

“I’m scared of this world,” she said quietly. “What kind of life can I give a child here?”

“A good one,” he told her.

“How can you know that for sure?”

“Maybe I just have to believe it.”

This time, she gripped his hand.

“I’m still scared,” she whispered.

“I think we all are.”

She could believe that. Jack, always with one eye on Ianto. Rhys, with his on Gwen. Ianto, trying to fake okay-ness. Gwen, trying to hold everything together. Not a single one of them went without their share of fear.

“If you die on me again, I will be so mad,” she informed him, once she had regained her composure.

“Noted,” he said.

And then he coughed his lungs up, practically.

“See, like that,” she said, rubbing his back again.

“I’m not dying.”

“You sure sound like it,” she teased.

His nose wrinkled and he rolled his eyes, but she could see the levity beyond the expression.

She nearly jumped out of her skin as she heard a click from the front door. Her heart raced for a few seconds, before she realised the only people who could unlock the door were either inside or had gone out this morning. That would be the returning crew, then.

Jack and Rhys entered the house, arms laden with plastic shopping bags. Gwen watched the way their eyes assessed the situation before breaking out into smiles in their own turn.

Everyone was scared. But that fear left room for such happiness when it was gone.

“Morning,” Rhys said. “I see you’re up.”

“Well, it’s impossible to sleep in dead silence when you’re used to sleeping with a chainsaw,” she said.

“Oi, watch it,” Rhys said, grinning madly.

Jack had already joined them near the sofa, dropping the bags off by Ianto’s feet (sneakily checking the oxygen concentrator as he did so).

“Got your refills,” Jack said, rifling through one of the bags.

“Oh, lovely,” Ianto said. “Just what I wanted. More pills.”

But he took the pill bottles when handed them, studying them to make sure they were accurately prescribed and filled.

“Did you cook?” Rhys asked, having moved in beside Jack and staring down at the plate on the coffee table.

“No,” she said. “What do you take me for? Some sort of housewife?”

“Never,” Rhys said fervidly.

“Quite sassy today,” Jack said. He folded his arms. “What did you two talk about when we were gone?”

“Those ridiculous moustaches,” said Ianto without hesitation.

Jack’s hand flew to the false hair glued over his lip. “Hey! They look fetching.”

“They do _not_ ,” Gwen said, eyeing Rhys’s.

“You should’ve seen me with mutton chops,” Jack said. “Now _that_ was a good look.”

Ianto said, “I doubt that very much.”

And then Jack launched down a rather tangential story about some old lover’s facial hair (or lack thereof). Rhys, typical lovely Rhys, got confused about some of the more alien bits, and asked questions that only served to drive Jack further off track.

Gwen and Ianto shared a look. The heaviness still sat there, in their gaze, but it felt a thousand times lighter now. Maybe this, right here, was proof they could figure it all out. That they could be okay again. Perhaps not soon, but someday.

Gwen’s hand once more sought out Ianto’s, and it was right there for her to hold.

**Author's Note:**

> Few final words to you, Daniela!  
> First of all, I did promise I'd written two more fics! So, if you liked this, there are still two more on the way, bare minimum. And who knows... I might write more! I keep getting ideas.  
> And there is a song that you could pair with this fic. [The Golden Age](https://open.spotify.com/track/0G2tHYsAHueVaPhTTBbVna?si=TZeD6Y30QsexFDiFFlHuRQ) by Woodkid (song, not the album--tho I do rec the album as a whole) really fits the vibes I have for this fic and the following few.  
> And that's really all I have, other than to say thank you for being a friend and overall just an amazing person!  
> Thank you for reading, and have a wonderful 2021!  
> 


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